Thursday, November 20 at 8pm, Alfa Art Gallery (108 Church Street)

For more information email: info@colab-arts.org

What makes for a good commencement?  Why are they often so boring or irrelevant to the experiences of the graduates?  What would make for a really meaningful graduation?  Do we need to have the caps and gowns?  What would you do to express what it means to get that diploma?  To have gotten through your program of study? To have survived the five-page long syllabi, the Deans, the crotchety professors, the financial aid snafus, the conflicting class schedules?  Come share your fantasies and let’s make something meaningful!

MILESTONES is a septology of audience-integrated solo shows about the milestones in our lives.  Written and performed by Pandora Scooter, these shows will be presented in chronological order from birth to graduation to marriage to birthdays to divorce to retirement to death.  Each show will ask the question: how do we process and celebrate milestones.  With humor and insight, passion and perspective, Pandora Scooter will guide the audience through a unique experience: exploring the meaning of milestones in our lives.

PANDORA SCOOTER is a spoken-word dynamo whose passionate rhymes and rants thrill and inspire audiences. Winner of the 2008 SpokenKnowledge DNC Contest for her piece OTHER.  Featured in CURVE MAGAZINE’s OUT IN FRONT series and on the Gay Center of NY’s OUT AT THE CENTER television show, Pandora performs up and down the East Coast.  She’s been put into categories including everything from stand-up comedy to hip-hop to folk poet to performance artist. Her work defies conventional labels, just as she does herself. A self-identified QUEERMAMASAPIEN, Pandora is pro-people, in all their glorious individualizations. She is an unyielding advocate on behalf of misfits and ‘fits,’ of all walks and talks. Pandora has performed at venues including: NJPAC’s HIP HOP: OUT, LOUD & PROUD as well as NJPAC’s Hip Hop Festival 2 and 3, Philly Queer Rock Show, PhaseFest (Washington DC) Baltimore Pride, Mississipi’s OUToberfest, Capitol Rainbowfest (Trenton, NJ’s Pride Celebration), Cornelia Street Cafe’s Pink Pony Series (NYC), Nuyorican Youth Slam (NYC), as well as featuring at numerous open-mics throughout New York City, New Jersey and Philadelphia. “I believe the world needs as much connection between people as possible. I’m out here to connect with as many people as I can – and to let people know it’s ok to connect with each other. To let them know that it’s ok to be everything they are and want to be – in all the complexities and confusions that make life what it is: one big, crazy, beautiful messy love storm.”  More info at www.pandorascooter.com.

March 27, 20097pm-3am

The theme of this ArtHouse is

SOCIAL MOVEMENTwhat is social movement? it’s how we talk, how we listen, how we love, how we celebrate, how we fight, how we struggle, how we learn, how we express, how we communicate. how we live.Hannabeil and Midnight Blue will be headlining, as well as featured as the house band for the stylings of a diverse collection of poets and performers, all expressing their own understanding of Social Movement.(showcase performers TBA)Insurgo Stage Project will conduct a Social Movement Experiment, engaging the audience in a performance piece dealing with social interaction and observation.Visual artists will engage their topic in their own right: exploring an extension of the theme of social movement —> being an artist is a political statement. what statement am i making?EON (Empower our Neighborhoods) will step to the mic and speak on their social movement.And YOU will take part in a living/evolving installation piece that will document the entire evening as it unfolds…WHAT IS ARTHOUSE?ArtHouse celebrates the artists who stay and fight; to all those who struggle to build something new, original and promising. A place for those who work to make New Brunswick a city you’re proud to be from and excited to come home to. In the spirit of its origins (the first ArtHouse in 1999 was a benefit for World AIDS Day), ArtHouse will continue to open the mic to all art forms, including the art form of change. This means that ArtHouse will continue to be a forum that invites dialogue concerning all aspects of life in New Brunswick, including social and political movements. ArtHouse considers these aspects of life (and of the community) just as important as and intrinsically connected to the enjoyment and creation of art.For the past 10 years, as more and more venues have been shut down and torn down, artists and organizers all over New Brunswick have transformed basements, garages, living rooms, and attics to host us artists in exile – with no other spaces to go. We hang words from the rafters, wrap music around basement poles, rearrange living rooms into galleries, dance on palettes. Share in the abundance of art that makes New Brunswick pulse.GET INVOLVEDCalling all artists/musicians/creators/organizers: interested in performing at ArtHouse? Want to volunteer to help make this event a success?Then come out to the next planning meeting:Monday, March 23 at 9:30 pm (message Avianna or Elena for location)Event Coordinators: Avianna Perez, Elena Callahan, Alana Integlia and Mary Ann Thomas$5-10 suggested donation at the door. Refreshments/Libations will be served for the afterparty…Interested? Inspired? Contact:Avianna Perez: aviannaz@gmail.comElena Callahan: elenacal@eden.rutgers.edu

Thursday, October 23rd at 10:00pm

Alfa Art Gallery (108 Church Street)

Tickets are $10 each

COLLABORATIVE ARTS and ALFA ART GALLERY present MILESTONES: It’s a Baby! written and performed by Pandora Scooter at Alfa Art Gallery (108 Church Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901) on Thursday, October 23 at 10:00pm.

Birth. We all have had one. How is it celebrated? How are little human beings welcomed into existence? Cultures around the world have birthing rituals. In some of our religions there are welcoming rituals for infants, but what about in the secular culture? How do we acknowledge this most important of milestones: being born? Come join in the inaugural show of this MILESTONES series and help create a great birth.

MILESTONES is a septology of audience-integrated solo shows about the milestones in our lives. Written and performed by Pandora Scooter, these shows will be presented in chronological order from birth to graduation to marriage to birthdays to divorce to retirement to death. Each show will ask the question: how do we process and celebrate milestones. With humor and insight, passion and perspective, Pandora Scooter will guide the audience through a unique experience: exploring the meaning of milestones in our lives.